Recommend a PCI card

Well the best you could get is a 9400GT and 8400GS for PCI, chances are your CPU will bottleneck those cards anyway....

I looked them up, and they were PCI-E, Are there any 256 mb+ regular PCI cards that you know of?

No, vouslavous is right. You can get the 9400GT (512MB or 1GB), 8500GT (256MB), HD2400 Pro (256MB) or 8400GS (256MB or 512MB) from NewEgg in PCI. I listed them in the order of best performing to worst performing (I think). I don't know the rest of your specs, but I bet you could run WoW at 1024x768 with one of the first two cards.

Oh, and since you were asking for a recommendation, the Sparkle 9400GT 512MB for $74.99 (at NewEgg) is probably the best PCI card for your budget.

I've tried 8400 GS PNY and the Windows XP stopped loading (the blue bar just stopped moving). No one has answered to the problem in my other thread, but I think it has to do with the low power output watts.

If it was a power issue, I think the computer would reboot. Have you tried going into safe mode and removing all display drivers?

Do you mean the driver for my monitor? Otherwise, I don't have any display driver since I bought my pre-built HP computer. It's A844n model if you still wonder.

9400GT is the highest you can go with video cards for PCI It has 1GB memory and even supports HDCP.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

....Why 1GB?

how in the hell could that be of any use?

not worth the extra $

^ You are right, but really depends on his res. and gaming res. I was just making sure if he had a higher resolution monitor that would be the best one.

Ahh, sorry forgot about the PCI bus, this usually is the slowest bus right now and its not really reccomended for a video card, I guess that the 1GB would be useless because the transfer rate would be slow. I dunno just a thought,

....the point of my original post..he shouldn't expect any gaming performance worth a .... from this system....well it could be acceptable for wow...

High res gaming on a pci bus.....*black guy* HAAAAEEEEELLLLLLL NAAAAWWWW

Why is that? Isn't more dedicated video memory always better? Seriously, I don't know. Learn me somethin'.

I too am looking for the best video card between 50-125$, in my case as a replacement for my 8500 GT, which only has one DVI. My application is pure home theatre (recording TV, watching internet programming, watching my own content in Media Center). I want to run two DVI signals simultaneously (24" LCD HP Monitor and Sony WPL 1080p projector) with the best results, and I am green on what the specs mean. Is the 9400 GT the best choice for me in your opinion?

Thanks!
Kevin

Are you on PCI as well or pci-e?

You see its only worth it if you can truly use it but alot of people will upgrade for 5$ even if they don't need it...for him gaming wouldn't make much of a difference as he won't be able to hit stable frames in gaming above the resolution of 1024x768...now you only need amoe than 512mb of vram past resolutions of 16xx/xxxx and it always helps to have the extra vram for games like crysis that use alot of vram at that resolution but below 16xx/xxxx resolution 512mb will do just fine....

Link to your pc Kevin and i can see which card you will need...shouldn't be a very expensive upgrade if your on pci-e

Thanks for your help!

My PC: HP Pavilion Elite m9000z CTO Desktop PC 3GB RAM

When I look up the specs on HP site, (http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/prodinfoCategory?lc=...),
I notice the following:

Expansion slots: Two PCI
One PCI Express x16 graphics (for a graphics card)
One PCI Express x1 (for cards such as network, sound, tv-tuner)

Video graphics Integrated graphics using nVidia GeForce 6150SE
Up to 256MB (with 512MB or more PC memory)
Also supports PCI Express x16 graphics cards*

NOTE: *Either integrated graphics or the PCI Express x16 slot are usable at one time; they are not usable concurrently.

I think that when I ordered the PC (~18 months ago), I upgraded from the 6150SE to the 8500GT/512MB... but I don't know whether it is PCI or PCI-E. I'm not local to the PC right now, so I can't check via NVidia control panel (although I've read that what's listed there is suspect anyway).

Since I have a PCI-E expansion slot, it doesn't matter, right? I should be able to remove the 8500 (whether PCI or PCI-E) and put in the new 9400 in the PCI-E (or whatever card you recommend is best for my use case) slot and be good to go?

Again, just want the best home theatre performance I can get from this PC. I also do a lot of home video editing (DVI tape over 1394) using Pinnacle Studio software.

Best regards,
Kevin

And I should also probably note that my 1080p projector, over DVI/(HDMI adapter) is putting out the image onto an 8 foot wide screen. Don't know if it matters, resolution-wise, speaking of what media center would put out... and I'm on Vista.

The 8500GT is practically almost not quite but close to the 8500GT. What are you planning to do with this card? Also please start another thread before asking questions. Thanks

Post a link to the new thread you create...and what ever you do don't buy a card yet

Here is the link to the new thread - sorry for breaking protocol!  

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/page-263725_15_0.ht...

9400GT

??? But the 9400 appears to be a single DVI out...

"I want to run two DVI signals simultaneously "

Sorry, I was replying to OP. Anyway, 2 9400GTs should do although it is a worthless expenditure @ $150. I suppose you get a DVI-VGA adapter?